Change To The Dow Jones STOXX SM Index Methodology - New Free Float Market Capitalisation Weighting (Effective September 18, 2000)

The STOXX Limited Supervisory Board - in consultation with its Advisory Committee - announces that free float market capitalisation weighting will be implemented in all the Dow Jones STOXX SM Indexes - i.e. including all blue chip, size, sector and broad indexes - effective September 18, 2000:

FREE FLOAT MARKET CAPITALISATION WEIGHTING

All the indexes will be free float market capitalisation-weighted - i.e. based on the number of free float shares outstanding for each of the component stocks - effective September 18, 2000.

The free float shares are specified as those that not held in block ownership: i.e. the number of free float shares equals the total number of outstanding shares minus the number of block owned shares.

Note: Block owned shares are government holdings, cross holdings from other companies and holdings from individuals or families each more than 5% of the total number of outstanding shares. Holdings by investment companies and funds, and also custodian holdings are not counted as block ownership.

"STOXX Limited - the publisher of the Dow Jones STOXX SM indexes - will be the first European regional index provider to implement free float market capitalisation weighting in all its indexes. This simultaneous implementation will ensure that the consistency, continuity and comparability of the Dow Jones STOXX SM indexes are strictly maintained. This change to the Dow Jones STOXX SM index methodology will enable investors to make meaningful comparisons of the performance of the European equity markets, across all relevant sub-regions and market sectors," said Michael Schanz, Managing Director of STOXX Limited.

He explained, "The free float market capitalisation weighting will ensure that the indexes accurately reflect the number of shares that are actually available to investors. Together with selecting only the largest and most liquid companies, the free float market capitalisation weighting will ensure that the Dow Jones STOXX SM indexes remain the most tradable and investable European equity indexes. Now, index-tracking investment funds will find it even easier to build their positions in companies with a large total market capitalisation but with a significant number of block owned shares." He announced, "In the run up to the annual review of the Dow Jones STOXX SM blue chip indexes in September 2000, the new free float market capitalisation weighting will be used for the blue chip selection lists starting July 2000. The lists will, therefore, indicate possible changes to the composition of the blue chip indexes at the forthcoming annual review, effective September 18, 2000."

"Also, in the event of any extraordinary corporate actions - such as mergers, demergers and acquisitions - involving these blue chip components and effective before the annual review, these new blue chip selection lists will be used to determine the changes to the composition of the blue chip indexes. In this way, the total number of component changes - between now and the annual review - will be reduced," concluded Michael Schanz.